The present invention pertains to communication systems and more particularly to a method for performance and fault management for a wireless telecommunications network.
Today mobile telecommunication networks are complex wireless systems. These mobile telecommunication networks generally provide very little data to a Network Management System for use by performance and fault management applications. This is in stark contrast to the amount of data generated by a telecommunication network node when coordinating call setup, call maintenance and call teardown activities with adjacent nodes.
Existing fault management systems correlate alarms and failures in software applications based on certain physical conditions of the telecommunication network. The objective of this correlation is to derive the nature and location of a fault or failure so repairs can be completed in an expeditious manner. This type of correlation requires an accurate definition of the relationships between failures and event notifications. Currently these relationships are identified through observation of the operational system and therefore cannot be defined until the operational characteristics of the deployed system are understood. As a result, a newly deployed mobile telecommunication network has poor fault management performance. This means there is further cost and time associated with deploying the new mobile network since many observations and behaviors must be made before the network can be efficiently run and maintained. In addition, the relationships between event notifications and failures are unique to a given physical network. There is no opportunity for cost savings through reuse of event notification/failure relationships.
Accordingly, what is needed is a robust fault management and system performance methodology available immediately when a mobile telecommunication system is put in service.